How To Build Roads To Control How Fast You Drive

An anonymous reader writes "They're the holy grail of transportation engineering: streets and highways specifically designed to encourage automobilists to drive less quickly, reducing the rates of passenger fatalities and generally encouraging a safer urban environment. And now new research shows that, if built right, they just might work. A new study out of the University of Connecticut suggests that minor reductions in vehicle speed are possible through changes in the street environment. Through the use of roadside parking, tighter building setbacks, and more commercial land uses, road designers can make drivers subconsciously drive more slowly." All of that is gonna work a lot better than my strategy of placing car-sized holes covered with twigs and branches randomly every half mile or so down the interstates.

Comments

I really DONT want to be European...

[Kral_Blbec]

It's really pissing me off how almost every day another story comes out about how great they are doing things across the pond and how us dumb Americans are behind. Even our roads are under scrutiny? You know, the ones that we have dozens of times more than they all do combined? Their roads are cramped, twisted, uneven, and generally unsafe. (Much of that is because they were first made for horses!) Now we want to copy that to "encourage drivers to slow down?" Stupidest idea of the day. Nice how they try the line about how

Dutch drivers are less than half as likely as their American counterparts to die in a road accident.

but fail to mention if they are counting urban and highway accidents separate. Thats kind of a big difference as you are much more likely to die in a accident at 70 than 25, yet Europe has a tiny fraction of the highways we have.
I can absolutely see some idiot city planner designing a new residential zone following these rules, only to have home shoppers refuse to buy anything in the area because the roads suck. People won't want to live with this crap.
Further, they are happy over a reduction of 2.3mph? That's less than the margin of error on your speedometer! Hit someone at 22.7mph and you will do just as much damage as at 25mph, and with less visibility and tighter proximity, collisions are going to be more likely.

Modest proposal:

[fahrbot-bot]

Simply mount large, sharp spikes to the center of the steering wheel in place of the airbag pointed directly at the driver's chest. I'm sure speeds will come down quite a bit...

Seems pretty dumb to me

[khallow]

They could get the same law abiding effect merely by increasing the speed limit. The gimmick here is that they make everything more complicated and less safe in order to slow drivers down. When they do that, they also should lower the effective speed limit. But they don't. In other words, they create a tougher road with an elevated speed limit.

Instead, they could have just raised the speed limit. It's far cheaper since you're just changing some road signs rather than massively redesigning the road.

Re:From the No Duh Dept.

[hldn]

this is why when someone is tailgating me on purpose to punish me for having the gall to drive the speedlimit or whatever messed up reasoning they have, i just give the breaks a good smack. if they manage not to hit me, it gives them a right fuckin scare and if they do hit me, oh well, there was a deer on the roadway and i had to break to not hit it. i've been rearended a number of times, but it's well worth it in my opinion as i'm sure those people stopped tailgating for a while at the very least.

Re:Fuck this article

[Apuleius]

"Cars today have more horsepower, more traction, better safety, and more braking power than cars 20-30 years ago.. Yet, our speed limits have decreased.. Why?"

Better safety for the driver. Less safety for pedestrians, motorcyclists, and often other drivers. So slow the hell down.

Re:Bullshit!

[Myopic]

No. People like you are the problem. YOU fuck off. We're all just trying to get somewhere. If you aren't driving faster than the person in the lane to your left, then you are driving like an asshole.

Not A Troll

[drinkypoo]

I live in California, where there is a serious concentration of illegal immigrants. I am not passing judgment on their presence here, just stating a fact. In particular I grew up in Santa Cruz, which is right in one of the most important agricultural regions in the state of California, and now live in Kelseyville, a town which is taking out pear trees as fast as they can (burns nice, though) and putting in grape vines which require even more water. If you live in SoCal and you're having water problems even though we have about as much water as ever, now you know why. Wine country has probably doubled in planted area in the last decade, if not worse. In both places there are super-shitloads of unlicensed illegal immigrant drivers. And even tons of the licensed are uninsured; my ex and I sold a car to one such, who wrecked it the same day he bought it, then abandoned it. Guess whose door the cops came knocking on? "Why did you abandon this car?" Sorry dude, it's not mine. Here's the paper we aren't even legally required to have sent in yet... signed yesterday.

Official estimates of illegal immigrant population are over 12M. These estimates are almost certainly low.